From Da to Yes: Understanding the East Europeans

by Yale Richmond

Now that communication barriers between Eastern Europe and countries of the former Soviet bloc have fallen, there are valuable opportunities for personal and business exchanges. Remaining, however, is the challenge of mutual understanding, as Eastern Europeans move from subservience to the East to cooperation with the West, in essence, moving from da to yes.From Da To Yes: Understanding the East Europeans offers a description of life in Eastern European countries, reviewing their shared history and making note of their past and ongoing struggles with alcoholism, ethnic cleansing, organized crime and environmental degradation. Featuring individual chapters on each country and its inhabitants, Yale Richmond pays close attention to each country's individuality, the personal characteristics of its people, its attitude toward the West, its most esteemed values and its preferred style of communication. From Da To Yes is a complete guide to Eastern European nations today and their connections to the West.A refreshingly clear writer, without pretense. Our understanding of the Eastern Europeans is indispensable and I believe that Yale Richmond's book fits that need very well. -Max M. Kampelman Contents Preface Acknowledgments Introduction: Encountering East Europeans 1 Slavs and Other Peoples 2 Poles 3 Czechs and Slovaks 4 Hungarians 5 Romanians and Moldovans 6 Bulgarians 7 Land of the South Slavs 8 Albanians 9 Balts 10 Belarusians 11 Ukrainians Appendix A: Tracing Roots Appendix B: Recommended Readings Index

320 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 1995

About the author

Yale Richmond served as a cultural officer in the U.S. Foreign Service with postings in Germany, Laos, Poland.

Reviews

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was probably a 5-star book at the time it was written, as it provides the reader with good cultural and historical background on nearly every country in eastern Europe. The most serious complaint about the book now is that it is dated. The warning not to drink the water in Bulgaria, for example, is obsolete now. I speculate that the negative ratings are from people who dislike anything that even hints of Orientalism, and they would be correct in observing that not everyone in each of these countries thinks or behaves in exactly the same way. But generalizations, such as provided in the book, give the reader or visitor a useful baseline for behaving with cultural sensitivity. In that respect, the book is still very useful, even if 30-40% of it is outdated.